POLL: Are you ready for winter weather?

Though Monday's storm ushered in cooler temperatures, true winter weather won't hit the area until later in the season.

The main push of colder weather will hold off until just before Christmas in the Chattanooga area, according to Paul Barys, WRCB-TV chief meteorologist.

"It probably won't get colder until the end of the month," he said. "I think January and February will be much colder. Everything's pointing to that."

Temperatures will continue to rise this week and reach the upper 50s by the weekend, and they are expected to remain above normal for the rest of the month, Barys said. Lows are expected to be in the lower to mid-30s for the week.

Normal highs for December are in the low 50s and normal lows are in the low 30s.

The most-wintry weather the area will see in the next seven days probably will be frost.

"Sorry," said Trisha Palmer, meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Peachtree City, Ga. "I don't know if it's a good thing or a bad thing -- there's probably not going to be snow."

Chattanoogans can continue to have an average amount of rain in December, and climatologists predict above-average precipitation for the next several months, Palmer said.

Monday's 0.6 inch of rain brought the area closer to average rainfall for the month of December. From Dec. 1 through Dec. 10, Chattanooga was more than an inch below the average precipitation for the time period, according to the National Weather Service in Morristown, Tenn. Average rainfall for December is 4.9 inches.